


Carry On

by DaaroMoltor



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Fluff and Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:42:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27307195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaaroMoltor/pseuds/DaaroMoltor
Summary: It really says a lot about the state of Stiles’ life that it ends up happening often enough that it qualifies as a pattern.A lot of very upsetting things, mostly.
Relationships: Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 26
Kudos: 447
Collections: Sterek





	Carry On

”Oh fuck.”

Stiles vaults himself round the trunk of a massive tree with the help of a slung-out arm. The mossy ground under his feet is wet and slippery and squelchy and seems to suck him in as he tries to run.

“Oh fuck oh fuck oh _fuck.”_

The roar behind him is so loud that it feels like it flattens his eardrums. He stumbles, catches himself on his hands, and keeps running. The tree trunk that he’s just dodged around shatters as the mitt of the massive bear-dog-thing crashes into it. Stiles yelps in fright as he ducks to evade the flying splinters.

“ _YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD_!” he shrieks back at the beast.

It replies with another ear-shattering roar, demonstrating again how very much not-dead it is.

Stiles needs to switch out his deodorant or detergent or something; all the monsters always end up chasing _him_ and it just isn't _reasonable._ Or fair. Stiles twists to look over his shoulder and sees purple eyes glowing between the trees, a disconcerting distance from the ground. A disconcerting _lack_ of distance from _him._

“Oh god fuck,” he whimpers and squeezes a little bit of extra speed from his already aching legs.

There had been a witch, a week ago, and she’d been absolutely one hundred percent certifiable, and they’d been forced to kill her as she’d started carving into Boyd for a blood sacrifice. Everything they’d read had sworn up and down that all her magic would die with her but, _evi-fucking-dently,_ the bear-dog from hell she’d conjured hasn’t gotten the memo.

Stiles glances back again.

And then the ground beneath him just _disappears_. For a moment, he's absolutely certain that a portal of the underworld has opened and that he's going to spend the rest of eternity being nibbled on by demons.

But it isn't a portal.

It's just a hole in the ground.

_Just._

Stiles’ foot hits the bottom of it and it twists so hard that he goes dizzy with it; hurts so much he can't even scream. All air seems to suck itself out of his lungs and a whimper slips past his lips. His vision goes momentarily black.

Then the crash of the beast through the trees brings him abruptly back to the more immediately pressing issue of being eaten alive.

“Oh god.”

Tears in the corners of his eyes, he plants his hands in the moss on either side and attempts to push himself out. But, as easily as it had slipped in, it seems that Stiles’ foot just _will not come out_. And each time it hits the mess of roots and dirt that keeps it trapped, the pain is enough to turn his stomach.

“SCOTT!” Stiles screams. “ _SCOTT!”_

The beast is nearly upon him, and Stiles can do nothing but curl into as small a ball as possible and _hope…_

Suddenly there is a deafening roar, sweetly familiar compared to the last he’d heard, and Stiles’ heart leaps in his chest.

He scrambles quickly to his elbows, just in time to see Erica crash into the bear-dog and knock it to its side. Boyd soon joins, quickly followed by Scott and Isaac. Claws and yowls and blood are all featured in abundance as the four wolves descend on the creature.

Stiles is still gaping at the spectacle of it, at the _timing,_ when suddenly-

“Come on,” Derek says sharply, grabbing under his arms and beginning to pull him up. “You need to go.”

Stiles startles at the unexpected touch and looks up. Derek had been full wolf last Stiles had seen him – before the bear-dog had forced him to run for his life – but now he’d powered down to only red eyes, claws, and a distractingly human bare upper body.

“ _Stiles.”_

“Yeah, yeah,” Stiles says hurriedly, wrapping his hands around Derek’s biceps and allows himself to be pulled upwards.

And maybe events had moved rather quickly, and maybe Stiles had been just the _littlest_ bit sidetracked, because he’s kind of forgotten what had kept him down when-

“Ow, _fuck!”_

“What’s wrong?” Derek demands, easing his clawed grip on Stiles’ arm.

Stiles digs his fingers deep into Derek’s naked arms and concentrates on breathing, on pulling air past the complicated contortions his throat is doing.

“My foot,” he manages to push out after a few moments. “It’s stuck.”

Derek looks down.

Then he takes one hand off of Stiles and rips away the ground, roots and all.

“There,” he says. “ _Now_ go.”

This time, though, he waits for Stiles’ twitchy nod before pulling him to his feet. Stiles moves his hands from Derek’s muscled arms and onto the bark of a reassuringly sturdy and un-sexy pine, and Derek has already taken a few steps towards the still ongoing brawl when Stiles first tries to put some weight on his twisted ankle.

It feels a bit like being punched in the stomach through his foot. 

Stiles wheezes and almost topples, and it's a few moments until he’s even gathered himself enough to swear.

“ _Holy mother of-_ what the _fuck_ are you doing!?”

“You’re hurt,” Derek grunts, _wrapping his arms more securely around Stiles._

“You’re _carrying_ me!” Stiles accuses, just as Derek sets off in a well-paced jog, holding him bridal-style in his arms. The jostle of the movement is enough for Stiles to have to throw his own arm around Derek’s neck to keep himself secure.

“You’re _hurt,”_ Derek repeats, more of his signature growl this time. “You can’t move, and you’d be in the way if you stayed where you were.”

“Oh, _so sorry_ my injury is inconveniencing you,” Stiles snaps. “I’ll try to be in less pain next time.”

Derek throws him a skeptical look. “Will you, now.”

Stiles takes great offense to Derek’s flat tone of voice – not even the barest hint of a question mark! He’d done nothing to deserve such condescension, nothing! – and wastes little time in telling him so.

Derek just huffs at him.

:::

The _I told you so_ spelled out by Derek’s eyebrows only a week after he’d started to be able to walk again is entirely uncalled for, in Stiles’ opinion. 

“Stop that,” Stiles says firmly, pushing at the left one with his thumb.

“Stop what?” Derek asks, barely out of breath despite their quick pace.

“ _That,”_ Stiles says, gesturing meaningfully.

“That’s my face,” Derek says.

“ _Exactly."_

The air is still thick with the scent of burnt rubber, and if there are tear-tracks running through the soot on Stiles’ face from the pain of his heavily blistered feet… well, at least Derek is kind enough to not point it out.

“Ugh, you have the _loudest_ eyebrows,” Stiles complains.

The aforementioned bushy lines rise.

“You’re not helping your case, dude,” Stiles helpfully points out.

“I _will_ drop you,” Derek threatens – emptily.

“I’m _wounded,”_ Stiles replies, because, while the black lines sneaking up Derek’s arm did a great job of carrying away the pain, he still needed a way to process the trauma – and banter beat CBT every time.

“And who’s fault is that?” Derek shoots back, just like he’d wanted.

“Uh, excuse me? How was I supposed to know that there was a whole damn _nest_ of giant scorpions? And that they could _breathe fire?_ It’s not like there’s a full-featured, BBC-produced, David Attenborough-narrated documentary on the subject of _the mating habits of the magical fire-breathing scorpion_ around.”

He attempts an impression of the British tv-icon.

It’s not his best work.

Derek’s flat look seems to agree.

“The whole forest reeks of sulfur.”

“Not exactly an obvious indication of fire-breathing capabilities!” Stiles protests. “They could have just been, like, particularly flatulent.”

Another flat look.

“There was smoke coming out of the ground,”

“Okay, one, not really a counter-argument to my flatulence theory,” Stiles points out. “And two, I’d like to remind you that you’re the one with the super-senses, wolfy-boy, not me. I can’t see in the dark like you can. Nor smell, for that matter.”

Stiles gestures to the gloomy forest night.

“You can’t smell in the dark?” Derek asks.

Stiles turns back to him in outrage, because how dare Derek misconstrue his elegantly crafted points for cheap victories.

Despite the dark of the night, though, Stiles doesn’t miss the twitching at the corner of Derek’s mouth.

:::

“They stole my _shoes,”_ Stiles says plaintively, not for the first time, sitting on his butt on a low tree-stump. “What do they even want with my _shoes?”_

“Whatever it is, it has nothing to do with fashion,” Lydia says.

Stiles thinks that’s rather harsh. He’s just suffered a great loss.

“I _liked_ those shoes,” he complains. “They were _comfortable.”_

“Maybe they were doing you a favor?” Lydia muses, as though he hasn’t spoken at all.

“Oh, yeah, now you have a reason to get new ones,” Erica chimes in.

“I _just_ bought them!” Stiles protests. “The fire-breathing scorpions melted my last ones!”

“They were _purple,”_ Lydia said, as though it makes the matter definite. “They hurt my eyes.”

“Not that I disagree that Stilinski’s shoes were a disgrace,” Jackson says, picking sticks and leaves out of his hair, “but the faeries didn’t seem like the type to do anybody any favors.”

“The _teeth,”_ Isaac says, a haunted look in his eyes.

“The shrieking,” Erica adds, with a similar expression.

“They were so _small,”_ Allison continues, frowning as she looks at the tip of the arrow she’s just collected from the ground.

“What do you think they did with Derek?” Boyd asks.

The group falls silent for a moment.

“They seemed to really like him, didn’t they?” Scott says, after a bit. “Like, _seriously_ like. Going on about his eyes and stuff? They won’t have done anything bad, right?”

“Maybe they want to keep them,” Jackson says, miming gouging his own out.

Lydia shoots him a disgusted look and shakes her head. “They swore he’d be unharmed. The lore said they couldn’t barter falsely.”

“Their definition of ‘unharmed’ might not be the same as ours,” Jackson points out, a bit too unrepentantly for Stiles’ tastes.

It has them going quiet again for a moment again, though.

“Do you think it has something to do with Stiles’ shoes?” Scott, once more, is the one to break the silence.

The whole group turns to him as one.

“What does that even _mean?”_ Erica asks.

“You think they’d harm him with Stiles’ shoes somehow?” Allison wonders.

“It _would_ work,” Jackson said, wrinkling his nose. “I can still smell his socks form over here.”

“You’re a supernatural creature of the night, jackass, that doesn’t mean _anything_!” Stiles defends, though he curls his toes a little tighter in his socks - a pointless effort to hold any smell back.

“I wouldn’t say that his feet is his most disturbing smell,” Boyd says mildly.

“Yeah, no, definitely not,” Isaac agrees, again getting that faraway traumatized look, even as his nose wrinkles.

“Oh, guys, you don’t even know,” Scott chimes in. “One time, when I went into his room, he’d-“

“Okay, thank you all very much!” Stiles interrupts loudly. “Stiles jerks off, we are all now very aware of this fact and we can stop discussing it!”

“I’d like to be less aware,” Jackson says, raising an arm as though it’s a show of hands in school.

“Then use a fucking clothespin,” Stiles retorts. “I’m a teenage boy, you shouldn’t be surprised by this!”

“I’m not surprised,” Jackson says. “I’m disgusted.”

“You’re technically an adult now,” Scott points out.

“Eight- _teen_ ,” Stiles says. “Teenage _man,_ then, whatever. Are you trying to tell me that you all don’t masturbate?!”

“Well, I certainly do,” Erica says easily.

“Me too,” Lydia says, flipping her hair over her shoulder.

There’s a pause.

Then Stiles bursts: “You never complain about _them_ smelling!”

“That’s because we’re aware of the practice of washing our hands,” Lydia says.

“And I guess there’s also generally less mess when we do it,” Allison says with a shrug.

Scott visibly startles and whips his head around to look at her. Allison smiles slightly at him and gives him a one-shouldered shrug. Scott goes red and a dopey look spreads across his face; he’s quite clearly checked out of reality and into a daydream.

Stiles sighs explosively.

“Also, girls always smell good,” Jackson says.

“Don’t be sexist,” Lydia says.

“How was that sexist!?” Jackson protests. “It was a _compliment_!”

Lydia shoots him a withering look and rolls her eyes as she launches into a lecture delving into the finer details of how he really should know better by now. 

Stiles' attention, however, has been caught by Isaac, who’s sniffing the air. Boyd notices too, a couple of moments later, and joins him in scenting the air. Their eyes meet and Stiles holds his breath.

“Derek is back,” Boyd says. “They released him to the south, it smells like.”

“By the fairy rings,” Stiles realizes, standing up. “Let’s go.”

They set off, except Erica heads in the wrong direction; towards him instead of south. Then she has suddenly scooped him up into his arms.

Stiles emits a very dignified squawk. “What are you doing!?”

“They took your shoes,” Erica says, very matter-of-factly, not so much as slowing as she turns and heads in the direction of Derek's scent. “You have delicate human feet that you’ll stab on all the pine-cones and then you’ll bleed all over the place.”

“I- wha- I’m not-!” Stiles splutters. 

Jackson laughs meanly. “Getting carried by a _girl,_ Stilinski?”

Stiles, Erica, and Lydia all raise their eyebrows at him.

Jackson shrinks in on himself.

“You know, maybe we should take a leaf out of Stiles’ book and reintroduce a higher degree of masturbation into our lives,” Lydia says, her voice ice.

Stiles cackles. Jackson’s narrowed gaze snaps to him, and perhaps it’s supposed to be intimidating, but it’s rather ruined by how Jackson looks mostly worried and confused. It’s another couple of seconds before he manages to parse Lydia’s words.

When he does, his eyes widen in horror.

“What, no, Lyds, I didn’t mean- You _can’t-_ I just wanted to- Stilinski-…” Jackson gestures wildly and sputters off into a pleading look.

“I’m just a girl,” Lydia says airily. “Surely you, a _man,_ will be more capable of taking care of yourself than I’d ever be.”

“Hey, there’s an idea,” Erica said, jostling Stiles around slightly to get a better hold, “since men are so good at everything, maybe you should try sleeping with one.”

Jackson sputters even more, and Stiles laughs even louder.

“Is there something _wrong_ with homosexuality, Jackson?” Lydia asked, voice saccharine.

“Remind me never to get on your bad side,” Stiles whispers to Erica as Jackson launches into another bout of pleading and explanations.

Erica made use of his prone position in her arms to pinch his ass. “Scared I will withhold sex from you, Stilinski?”

Stiles yelped at the nip but recovers quickly and grins at her.

“Terrified,” he agrees.

“Hmm,” Erica says, after flashing him an answering smirk, mock ponderingly. “If you were mine, I don’t think that’s what you’d need to worry about.”

“Oh, yeah?” Stiles asks, wiggling his eyebrows.

Erica’s gaze turns half-lidded and her smile into a leer.

“Not really my style,” she confirms, flipping her hair away from her face with a flick of her neck. “No, what _I_ think is that, if you have views like that, what you really need is a lesson in _appreciating_ women. A _deep_ and _thorough_ lesson, most likely in several parts. I’d tie you down, of course, so there’d be no question of who’s calling the shots. And you’d need to be punished, too, since you’d have been _so_ _naughty_. A collar for you, maybe, since you seem to like your dog-jokes so much? And maybe you’d-“

“Glad to know I’ve been missed.”

Stiles chokes on his laughter at Erica’s outrageousness and whips around.

And chokes again.

Derek’s mouth is flat and tight, and his brows pulled together and down in an epic bitch-face. It’s not too surprising of a thing to see, considering his tone. The _rest_ of him, though…

He’s-

The-

Derek is-

Stiles brain crashes and has to do a reboot, and then he _still_ doesn’t really know where to begin.

Well, Derek’s naked, that’s a start. Or, well, very nearly naked; all he’s wearing is a golden cloth wrapped around his midsection. It’s like something some spiritual guru-figure would wear, or what you’d usually get when you strip the playable characters in RPGs. It should look ridiculous, but it’s Derek, so obviously it doesn’t. (Because Stiles’ life is very, _deeply_ unfair.)

His body has also been oiled, or at least been slathered in something very much like it. It’s bronze-hued and shining, every ripple of muscle catching and reflecting even the dim light of the forest.

And it’s really quite impressive that the whole gleaming near-nakedness kind of isn’t the most stand-out feature he has going on right at that moment. (Though, admittedly, Stiles devotes enough attention to it that he nearly gets some stand-out features of his own.)

No, what takes the cake are the tattoos wrapping around his body.

As in, _literally_ wrapping.

As in _moving._

Vines snake across his arms and legs, multiplies and splits and grows together, all the while swaying in a weirdly undulating fashion. The growth runs like a necklace around his throat, swirls around his pecs and his navel, wraps around his hips, and disappears beneath the gold cloth and down to-

Stiles swallows thickly.

The crown of flowers adorning Derek’s head is the least of it, honestly.

Safest to comment on, though.

“I like what you’ve done with your hair,” Stiles says, and is rather pleased with how not-strangled his voice comes out.

“The flowers have thorns,” Derek says, voice flat. “I can’t get them out.”

“I’ll help,” Stiles offers, entirely without input from the rational parts of his brain.

Derek’s eyes narrow.

And then that look suddenly moves up from Stiles to Erica, still holding him in her arms.

She promptly walks over to Derek and suddenly Stiles is sitting on Derek’s back.

“I- er- hi?” Stiles says, quickly grabbing Derek’s shoulders for balance.

He’s got the flower-crown right in his face. The flowers are small and delicate, in yellow and in white, and there’s indeed a great number of needle-sharp thorns on their stems. More than that, though, Stiles suspects that the reason Derek hasn’t gotten them off is because of the thin vines that seem to have grown into and wrapped securely around strands of his hair.

Stiles grimaces at it, thinking it won’t be an easy feat to get that off.

Derek shifts him about slightly, getting a firmer grip around his thighs.

Stiles stops breathing and tries desperately to think of literally _anything else_ but the feeling of Derek’s fingers firmly on his inseam; pressed against Derek’s back as he is, there’s very little room for… _discretion,_ should something, well, _arise_.

The tattoo catches his attention, and that seems good enough. He’d thought the tattoo was just a flat black, but this close he can see that the leaves have a dark-green hue to them.

“Are these permanent?” he asks, forcing himself to sound casual. “Looks like it might be long sleeves for you from here on out, if that’s the case.”

And wouldn’t that be a tragedy?

“I don’t know,” Derek answers, and starts walking.

Stiles turns and watches the rest of the pack hesitate for a moment, trade a look amongst themselves, and then follow. Boyd is wrinkling his nose.

“You know, you look like you’d be sticky,” Stiles says, mostly because he feels like he needs to keep occupying his brain with something to stop it from going to the place it’d inevitably descend to if he were to give it free rein. “You’re so shiny, but you just kind of feel smooth. Like you’ve used body lotion or something. Did the faeries lotion you up?”

This topic is kind of close to dangerous territory, though, he has to admit. Derek is, indeed, very smooth under his palms, smooth and hot, and there really is a very great amount of skin on show. And Stiles is so close to it that even his human nose can smell it, smell _Derek,_ mingled with an earthy sort of scent and the sweet fragrance coming from the flowers…

Fuck, oh god, abort. Finstock in tight shorts. His dad. That time Scott threw up after having been dared to eat crayons in second grade. The unnecessarily graphic images of adult circumcision he’d found during his research-binge.

“I don’t want to talk about it, Stiles.”

Stiles clings to the lifeline, the distraction. “Hey, I gave up my shoes for you! You shouldn’t be so grumpy with me.”

Stiles wiggles his toes where they stick out in plain view in front of the two of them. Fuck, he should be getting an Oscar with how normal he’s acting.

“I appreciate the sacrifice,” Derek says, heavy on the sarcasm.

“You know, Erica was afraid I’d impale myself on a pinecone and bleed to death,” he informs him.

He glances back at Erica the pack, mostly as an excuse to turn his face away from Derek for a moment. Erica won’t meet his gaze, however, and her face is doing something strange. He narrows his eyes at her, but it doesn’t exactly have much of an impact when she won’t look at him.

“Wouldn’t that have been a tragedy,” Derek deadpans.

Stiles turns his glare at the back of Derek’s head.

“You know, she was doing a perfectly fine job of carrying me. You didn’t have to take over.”

Derek’s fingers dig suddenly deeper into his thighs, and Stiles chokes.

“Oh god, dude, I’m not planning on jumping off you or anything, you can stop cutting off my blood flow!” 

_De_ creased blood flow is the absolute _least_ worry Stiles has at this moment, but at least his protest results in Derek easing off, so he counts it as a success.

“I guess I’m higher up with you, anyway,” he says, as a concession, a few moments later. “Means I get a better view.”

And isn’t that the truth, for all the wrong reasons?

Derek just grunts.

:::

The scales shimmer like jewels in the sunlight, bronze and gold and amber, shifting almost to a deep emerald in the right angle. The transition to the milky white skin by his hip is smooth and seamless.

And _very_ far down, Stiles feels.

The _‘v’_ of his hips is plainly visible above the first line, and he could have sworn that his pubes had started further up than where the first scattering of scales begin now.

He keeps twitching with the impulse to cover his groin.

Except he no longer _has_ a groin.

( _Except he still has a pelvic area, doesn’t he, since he has hips? Or, wait, what’s the definition of a groin? Does it include the junk? Oh god, does he still **have** junk? He has to, hasn’t he, or there’d have to be some sort of asexual reproduction going on, which doesn’t seem evolutionarily sound. Or, wait, fish lay eggs, right? Caviar is a thing. And then daddy-fish comes along and just kind of squirts his daddy-juice all over the eggs, and maybe it’s something like that. That kind of makes sense, considering. That would mean there’s some small hole somewhere, though, surely. But what if-)_

“You’re a mermaid,” Isaac says, interrupting Stiles’ mental tangent.

Stiles squawks and slaps his hand over where his dick should have been.

_(Oh god, he doesn’t have a dick!!)_

The persistent feeling that he’s _completely naked_ won’t leave him. It’s not exactly wrong, of course, it’s just that he’s got six feet of fins instead of two feet with assorted legs and privates dangling in between and _oh sweet Jesus his privates have been far **too** private for him to not have them anymore. _Is there a warranty? He’s got a completely and depressingly intact manufacturer’s seal and he really feels like that should count for something.

(Hah, seal – because fins, and-… nevermind.)

Stiles gulps for breath.

It’s hard to keep stable with a giant slab of half-a-fish instead of legs, so he has to forgo preserving his modesty when he loses his balance and falls back towards the mossy ground.

There really is an ungodly amount of glittering and sparkling going on all over his lower half, he notes at this new and improved angle, and how did this much sunlight find its way all the way through the canopy anyway?

His feelings of nakedness aren’t helped by the amount of staring going on.

Erica, especially, is eyeing the area where skin turns into scales with great interest.

“Hey!” Stiles barks. “My eyes are up here!”

She looks up at his face, holds his eyes for a moment, and then her mouth widens into a smile with altogether too many teeth.

“Do you need to be in water?” Derek asks sharply.

“Uh, what, no, I-…” Stiles pauses, actually takes stock for a moment. “No, I can breathe just fine, and it doesn’t feel like that going to change anytime soon. My- er, the fin is a starting to get a bit itchy, though? I think it might be drying out.”

Derek forgoes responding and instead stomps over towards the pond the merpeople descended back into not three minutes ago. The waters look dark and murky and Stiles is still feeling very grateful that they were able to persuade them than, no, he really did belong on dry land, thanks. Well, when he says ‘ _persuade’…_ Even though they apparently weren’t above pettily trying to prove him wrong. As though Stiles would just accept being recast as Ariel! He bets there aren’t even any singing crustaceans to befriend under _this_ sea.

Pond.

Whatever.

Derek suddenly pulls the shirt off his back and derails Stiles’ thought process. Then he dunks it in the lake.

(The shirt, not the thought process.)

Then he comes stomping back.

“Here,” he says, throwing the wet garment at him.

“Hey!” Stiles protest when it splashes against his chest, but then immediately changes his mind; the water _does_ feel very nice when it drops down on his scales. “Oh. Nevermind. Thanks.”

Without really analyzing the whole thing any further than that, he begins rubbing the cloth across his lap to get his fin damp again.

Then one of the wolves makes a choking noise.

Stiles' head snaps up towards the sound, and it turns out to have been Isaac. He’s red in the face and Stiles looks down at the shirt bunched up in his hand. And he realizes that, in a werewolf’s eyes – or nose, rather –, he’s basically rubbing _Eau de Derek_ all over himself.

“Stop that!” Stiles demands in outrage, feeling his face going red. “I’m just making myself wet!”

“Oh, I’m sure you are,” Erica says quickly, breaking down into giggles.

Stiles sputters and flushes so deeply his face hurts.

“Derek gave it to me!” he protests.

That makes the snickering stop with alarming immediacy and suddenly everyone seems very careful to not look at anybody else. Stiles’ stomach plummets as he realizes what he’s accidentally implied.

“Shut up, all of you,” Derek growls, even though it’s already quiet; at least it saves Stiles from trying to explain himself. “We need to get him to the house. We don’t know what happens if he actually dries out.”

Everyone gets into a big hurry at that, though Stiles isn’t sure they launch themselves at the task because of genuine alarm or simply because it’s a distraction.

For him, it’s about fifty-fifty.

Scott hurries to take over Derek’s shirt and rubs it all the way down the fin where Stiles can’t reach. Isaac wrenches himself out of his hoodie and goes to dunk that in the water as well. Erica latches on to Boyd and starts talking about making a stretcher.

“It’s fine,” Derek says. “I’ll carry him. Just someone help me get him off the ground.”

They all go in to help, but it turns out that Stiles' new bottom-half is very slippery. They drop him enough times that he’s certain his human ass will be black and blue if he ever gets it back, and each time he lands on the ground little pine needles get caught beneath his scales and it stings like _hell._

Finally they manage it, though. Stiles is up on Derek’s shoulder, the corner of it digging ruthlessly into Stiles’ abdomen. His ass is in the air and his fin is flopping uselessly in front, wrapped in Derek’s and Isaac’s shirts to keep it moist. He has to bend it up a bit to keep it off the ground and it’s really quite a strain.

“Oh god, hurry up,” Stiles chokes out. “I can’t breathe.”

He’s also hanging upside down with no place to look except Derek’s ass and, junk or no junk, that doesn’t seem like a very safe state of affairs.

“Your fin weighs like two hundred pounds,” Derek complains, straining under his weight even with werewolf strength. “Be happy we didn’t just leave you to the creepy lake-people.”

“Hey, that’s offensive!” Stiles protest.

“Really?” Derek asks. “How?”

“I-… I feel offended by it, that’s how!”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not how that works,” Derek says, sounding strained, hefting him a little higher when he slides down. “Hold on to my waist, would you? You’re too slippery.”

Stiles tries to half-ass it for his own sanity' sake, but Derek keeps telling him to hold tighter until it’s basically a firm hug and Stiles’ cheek is practically pressed against Derek’s… well, cheek.

Okay, so he’s still a little bit higher up, but it’s definitely _way_ too close for comfort.

They keep a fairly good pace through the woods, made even better once they figure out a way for Boyd to hold his fin that doesn’t immediately cause Stiles to slip off Derek’s shoulder. It saves Stiles from holding it up, too, which is a blessing.

It takes them about half an hour until they’re slamming the door to Derek’s house open.

Lydia and Allison, who’d bowed out of the day’s supernatural activities to cram for their SATs, jump to their feet.

“What have you gotten yourself into this time?” Lydia demands impatiently.

“It wasn’t my fault!” Stiles protests.

“ _Stiles!?”_ Allison exclaims, sounding startled.

Possibly due to the fact that he’d come in fin-first, and that hadn’t exactly been one of his defining features when he woke up this morning.

“Hi!” he says, waving from behind Derek’s back.

“Out of the way,” Derek demands growly-ly, not even slowing as he does.

Lydia and Allison both hurry to the side and Derek dumps him unceremoniously on the couch. There’s a crunch of paper and there’s a three-ring binder digging into his spine, but Stiles feels only relief.

“Oh god,” he gasps. “I can breathe again!”

Derek collapses to the floor beside him. “Don’t pretend you got the short end of the stick.”

“Dude!” Stiles protests. “I am _half fish!”_

Derek actually winces a bit at that. “Fair point.”

“Is it permanent?” Lydia asks, frowning down at him.

Stiles groans, covering his face, and Boyd answers for him: “We don’t know.”

“How did it happen?” Allison wants to know, wrapping an arm around Scott as he comes to stand beside her.

“Well, you know the little lake north of here?” Scott asks. “With the tiny rocky beach where the bottom is all slimy? Turns out there are mermaids in it.” 

“Mer _people,”_ Stiles corrects, digging the binder out from underneath his back, feeling like it’s his right to be picky about terminology now that he’s one of them.

“I don’t see how that ends with Stiles becoming part fish?” Lydia says.

“They wanted to keep him,” Scott says, shrugging. “Derek wouldn’t let them.”

“What do you mean ‘ _Derek wouldn’t let them’_!?” Stiles demands. “Are you saying you would have just let them take me to a life under the sea if he hadn’t been there?!”

“No, of course not! I just meant that-“

“They grabbed Stiles and dragged him into the water,” Boyd interrupts. “Derek grabbed him back and dragged him back up again. When he did, Stiles came with a fin.”

“Ta-da,” Stiles says without cheer, making jazz hands at his newly acquired body part.

The couch-springs creak worryingly when he shifts slightly. Stiles winces. It really must weigh quite a lot.

“I guess we’re telling your dad that you’re sleeping at my place tonight,” Scott says, smiling sheepishly.

Stiles groans again. “Oh god, my _dad._ He doesn’t even like fish!”

“Do you mean eating it?” Erica wonders. “Or does he have an aversion to, like, guppies?”

Stiles usually loves a nice grilled salmon but feels suddenly affronted that anyone would even _suggest_ eating fish.

“Whichever it is,” Allison says before he can voice his outrage, reaching out towards the very tip of his fin, “I don’t think that’s the biggest of your troubles.”

Her thumb and forefinger close around the slightly translucent tip and Stiles does a full-body shudder.

“Sorry,” she says quickly, withdrawing.

“That feels _weird,”_ Stiles complains, flicking it slightly.

Derek gets to his feet.

“Are you wet enough?”

Lydia’s eyebrows rise. “My, what a gentlemanly question.”

Derek gives her a flat look while the rest of the pack tries to choke down their snickers.

“Your _fin,”_ Derek says, not taking his eyes off Lydia. “Do you need more water on it?”

Stiles, valiantly pretending he’s not blushing says: “What? No, dude, I’m on your couch! You can’t go bringing wet stuff onto this! It’ll ruin it!”

Derek looks at him.

“You’ll be uncomfortable,” is all he says.

Then he leaves the room.

Stiles doesn’t really know what to do with himself at that, and neither seems the rest of the pack. After all, they all still have functioning legs and _still_ they just stand there.

Derek’s only gone for maybe a minute, though, before he comes back with two towels in his hands; one wet, one dry.

“Lay on this,” Derek says, holding up the dry. “And then put this one over your fin.”

It’s weirdly touching, and Stiles has to do his best to not get mushy over _towels,_ of all things.

It’s a bit finicky to get the dry one underneath him, but they manage eventually through having Scott and Boyd lifting him as Derek shoves the towel in place. During this maneuver, the back of Derek’s hand grazes his scaled bum. His scaled bum seems to have much the same touch receptors as his usual version, and he forcefully avoids any and all eye-contact as he works on forcing his blush away.

Eventually, he’s settled in, though, and Derek drapes the wet towel over him.

After that, they all get settled in around the table. Stiles is now long enough that he takes up the entirety of the couch by himself, but Erica lifts the end of his fin and puts it in her lap. The rest of the pack settles in on the armchairs and pillows. Derek re-assumes the position on the flor by Stiles’ side.

Allison and Lydia clear up their studying material, and slowly but surely the table is re-cluttered with foul-smelling old books bound in leather, dictionaries in Latin, and pages from the compendium of magic Stiles printed out from a potentially-actually-real website on witchcraft about a year ago. They debate if the water itself might be magic, or if the merpeople have witches among them. Or maybe all of them are? Perhaps they’re like werewolves, and they turn people that bite them? Stiles gives as detailed a description of being turned as possible (which is mostly “it felt very cold”) and Lydia writes it all down in the notebook she never goes without.

Stiles thinks that, while his life is most definitely a clusterfuck, it’s also kind of nice.

They get Chinese – Stiles forbidding everyone from ordering anything with shrimp –, come to few conclusions, and eventually agree to meet up again tomorrow.

“You can sleep here,” Derek offers.

“You just can’t be bothered to carry me to the car,” Stiles retorts, even as he makes himself more comfortable on the couch.

“That,” Derek agrees, “and if Scott’s neighbors happen to come by as he’s dragging you back out again, it’s going to be pretty hard to explain.”

“Oh, yeah, point,” Stiles concedes. “Ugh, imagine if we got stopped on the way?”

Even as he says it, he realizes that this basically means that he’s staying at Derek’s until he’s gotten rid of his fin. And, yeah, okay, that thought makes his stomach flutter a bit, but it also means that he’s _not_ seeing his dad for that same amount of time.

“We’ll figure this out,” Scott says with an encouraging little smile. “I’m sure you’ll be better in no time.”

Stiles smiles back, even though it’s a bit forced. “Yeah, I’m sure.”

There are goodbyes and reassurances and some stray speculation on where they might pick up the mystery tomorrow, and then everyone has filed out the door and waved goodbye.

Derek closes it and twists the lock.

Then he turns to Stiles.

Stiles isn’t sure when they were alone in the house last, if ever, and it seems suddenly very quiet.

Stiles licks his lips.

“I could probably carry you up to the bathtub if you want,” Derek offers. “If you think you’d be more comfortable there, I mean.”

Stiles wrinkles his nose and shakes his head. The tub is short enough that he can’t sit straight in it even with his regular bottom half, and with an additional three or four feet it’s bound to be cramped as fuck. “Nah, I’m good, but thanks for the offer.”

Derek nods, almost a bit to himself.

“Okay, well, do you want a glass of water or anything before I head upstairs?” he asks.

And, oh… Yeah, fair enough, it’s like ten thirty, and that’s a normal-ish (if fairly boring) bedtime even for a weekend. It stills feels a little too much like Derek abandoning him as soon as humanly possible for it not to send a little twang of sadness through Stiles.

“Oh, er, if you’d chuck me the remote for the TV, maybe?” he asks, not sure he’ll be able to fall asleep yet. “I mean, if that’s okay? D’you think you’d be able to sleep through that?”

Derek assures him it’ll be fine, hands him the remote, and then he’s disappeared upstairs.

Stiles tugs the wet towel up over his body like a blanket and flips through the channels until he’s settled in in front of a marathon rerun of old MythBusters episodes.

It’s nearing twelve when he falls asleep.

It’s still dark when he wakes up.

He shoots upright, full-body flailing, still halfway gripped by a nightmare. The towel, not even damp anymore, goes flying across the room and narrowly misses hitting the TV.

Stiles barely notices.

His tail feels like a thousand tiny ants are nibbling it.

“What the _fuck,”_ he whispers to himself, bending down to scratch at it.

Scratching does _not_ help.

“Oh, ow, fuck, please, what.”

He lays back down again, arms by his side and rigid as a board, and hopes it works like a mosquito bite; just don’t touch it and it’ll get better.

It doesn’t work.

The minutes pass and the nibbling feeling grows to a prickling, like static, and then the prickling sensation increases even more, and it pushes a pathetic little mewl out of him. And then it’s a bit of a fucking stretch to even call it prickling anymore, because it’s just _pain_. A tearing sort of pain that seems to expand within him, push the boundaries of his skin, like something about to explode.

Mother of _fuck._

“Derek,” he manages. “ _Derek!”_

It hurts. Holy _fuck_ it hurts. It takes over his mind, makes him feel almost claustrophobic because he has to get _away,_ he can’t stay with this, something awful is going to happen, like he’s literally going to _die_ because it just grows and grows and Stiles has no fucking clue how he’s going to survive the crescendo-

Derek tears into the room, eyes glowing red.

“Stiles!”

Stiles can only scream in response.

Then the pain _explodes_.

… and then it’s just _gone_.

Derek and Stiles stare at each other, both panting heavily, for a moment.

Then they simultaneously seem to realize that Stiles' lower half is back to being fully human, with all the nakedness that comes with it. Delight is quickly swallowed by mortification as Stiles slaps his hands down over his – mercifully intact, _un_ -mercifully exposed – dick.

The silence stretches.

Then Derek asks: “Do you want to borrow some underwear?”

:::

Stiles stares fixedly out over the forest floor, strewn with yellow leaves and smelling like fall, and listens intently to figure out what’s going on. All has gone abruptly quiet, though, save for the sound of several people panting heavily. And ‘several’ is good and all, but he’d really love a more specific number.

He would yell exactly this at his stupid, inconsiderate pack – but he can’t.

If only he'd fallen facing the other direction.

He hears leaves crunching beneath someone’s feet, and then Isaac crouches in front of him. He tilts his head.

“You’re an idiot,” he says.

Not really rude, or anything, more like it’s a statement of fact.

Stiles would reply, but his jaw still won’t move, so all he manages is a huff. At least it has the added benefit of blowing away the leaf-stem that’s been threatening to poke inside his nostril. Isaac seems unimpressed, however.

Erica comes to stand behind Isaac.

“It was very nice of you to jump between,” she says, “but it wasn’t really necessary.”

 _Not necessary,_ Stiles’ fucking _ass._ Perhaps if they would have waited ten fucking minutes to let him finish the translation and then they’d fucking know just how _‘unnecessary’_ it had been.

Derek, who’d been at an honest-to-god fucking job interview until Stiles had called him in a screaming panic, comes crashing through the trees.

“ _Is everyone okay_?” he demands, growling through his canines.

It’s an odd thing to ask menacingly but, hey, that’s Derek for you.

Stiles can only see Isaac and Erica, but he assumes all the ‘weres are trading a look based on their faces.

“Yeah,” Isaac says. “Why wouldn’t we be?”

Derek’s ever so expressive eyebrows rise, and he gestures angrily towards where Stiles assumes the snake-goat-bird is currently laying in a heap.

“What do you mean?” asks Erica. “The book said the venom-stuff only paralyzes non-magicals.”

And this is where Derek shares the little tidbit that Stiles had discovered but no one else had bothered translating, since it’d been written in the footnotes: paralysis for non-supes, gruesome _death_ for everyone else.

Stiles would feel smug about the act-first-think-never part of his pack getting yelled at by Derek for not doing their homework properly, except he hasn’t worked his way all the way through the whole bone-chilling-terror stage yet.

Not that Stiles doesn’t have plenty of time to do so, though, as he lays paralyzed on the ground and the yelling proceeds. Following a rather predictable path, if Stiles is to be honest: _you are reckless fools and shall not do anything ever without your alpha,_ followed by _oh no, it was all his/her/them/their fault and not me,_ which inevitably led to a flurry of _that’s not true-_ s and _I don’t care your all responsible-_ s. And across it all: a dusting of _there’s no reason to be upset since everything worked out fine anyway._

And sure, alright, Stiles only used his body as a shield to save his moronic friends from certain death and is now paralyzed for a number of hours apparently determined by his body mass and the relative position of Jupiter, it’s whatever.

Stiles stares at leaves while everyone gets the yelling out of their systems.

At least the ground smells kind of good. Kind of fall-y. He could have landed in a pile of poop, and wouldn’t that have sucked?

Finally, Derek’s hands close around his arm and his hips and roll him over to his back.

“Blink twice if you’re okay,” Derek instructs.

Stiles does as told.

Derek glares at him at that which _what,_ hello, _entirely_ unwarranted! A certain proof of bias against him!

“Really? Using yourself as a human shield was the only thing you could think of?” he grouses.

Oh. Perhaps slightly warranted then, if mostly just unappreciative of Stiles' heroic sacrifice.

Stiles gives Derek a firm blink in complaint.

Derek sends the rest of the pack away and slings Stiles up on his shoulder.

“I’m taking you to your house,” Derek says. “It’s closer than mine if we need to get you to the hospital.”

Stiles says nothing in reply, because he’s paralyzed.

“It’s the second Saturday of the month, so your dad’s at the station, right?” Derek asks.

Again, Stiles doesn’t reply because- well, see above.

Derek jostles him into a better position on his shoulder.

“This is so strange,” he mutters to himself as he sets off.

Stiles really can’t do anything but agree (even if it's not out loud).

Derek’s pace is brisk but not a jog, which Stiles appreciates, since the current amount of bouncing still feel like it’s bruising his intestines. He is finding the lack of fin this time to be an upgrade, though, both for the fact that his legs are a great deal shorter and so in no danger of dragging across the ground if he doesn’t hold them up, and also because his more human length has allowed Derek a slightly different point of equilibrium for his body. Meaning that Stiles' face hasn’t ended up pressed against Derek’s bum again.

(Because Stiles has a strong suspicion that paralytic venom does not affect the cardiovascular system in a way that would currently be convenient.)

(Wait, are boners fueled by the cardiovascular system?)

Stiles has fallen deep into ponderings when Derek suddenly stops and kneels to put him down, careful to catch his head before it falls against the moss. Stiles has absolutely no fucking idea about what’s prompted this, but has little choice but to go with the flow.

Derek stands up again and stares down at him for several long moments.

Stiles stares patiently back.

“It’s very unnerving when you’re this quiet,” Derek says, finally. “I keep thinking that you’ve died.”

Stiles is just about to roll his eyes, but then the complicated look on Derek’s face as he looks down at him stays him.

Stiles blinks twice up at Derek, though he doesn’t quite know what it’s supposed to communicate, himself.

Derek proceeds to stare at him for quite a lot longer in complete silence.

Full-body paralysis is probably the only thing that could have made Stiles stay still and silent for this long at this point in his life. He hopes Derek is savoring it.

Finally the deep introspective seems to be over though, as Derek bends to pick him back up again – this time carrying him bridal-style in his arms. It takes a bit of finicking, since Stiles' body is currently doing an excellent impression of an overboiled noodle, but Derek gets there in the end.

As he sets off once more, he glances down at Stiles and says: “This way I can see if you stop breathing.”

Stiles doesn’t point out that Derek has super-hearing and would be able to tell if Stiles had trouble breathing probably before even Stiles did, because that seems a bit rude in the face of Derek’s heartwarming show of concern.

Also, you know, paralysis.

They trudge through the woods a while longer, and Stiles slowly regains enough muscle function to stop his head swinging like a pendulum across Derek’s arm with every step. And that’s pretty great, actually, since all the swinging about has started to make him motion-sick. His fingertips and tongue also start tingling in a way that makes him hopeful that Jupiter might actually be in a pretty advantageous position for this whole deal.

These small steps in the right direction are hardly enough to make a difference to Derek, however; super-strength or no, it turns out it’s pretty hard to keep hold of someone that has lost all ability to keep hold of themselves.

“Why do you have to be this _floppy,_ ” Derek complains as Stiles’ body begins to slip out of his arms for about the four hundredth time.

“That’s what she said,” Stiles promptly croaks.

Derek startles, though Stiles can only tell because he’s literally pressed against Derek’s body.

Then he gives him a flat look.

“ _That’s_ the first thing you say?” Derek asks. “How long have you been able to talk, anyway?”

“You greatly overestimate my self-restraint,” Stiles says, voice still hoarse.

Because the truth is that he hadn’t actually been aware that he’d been able to; the moment had simply seemed to demand the comment to be made. And who was Stiles to deny destiny?

At least the rest of the way to the house is more entertaining, even though Stiles' words are still pretty slurred by the time they’ve nearly reached his backyard. He’d still managed to get Derek into a spirited debate of the implications of the fact that they keep talking about _balance_ to the force in all the Star Wars movies.

( _“ **Balance** doesn’t mean all one side, Derek! They’re basically admitting that they **need** the sith!” _

_“It’s been like twenty years since the franchise released a good movie, Stiles, how can you still be this invested?”_

_“Okay, one, you are such a grump. Two, there’s books man! Like, thousands of books!”_

_“Have you read any of them?”_

_“Well, okay, no, not as of right this minute. But I’ve been meaning to!”_ )

And perhaps that’s why Derek hadn’t noticed anything amiss.

And why today is the day that Stiles finally hears the words he's spent years trying to avoid:

"What are you doing with my son, Hale?"

Both Derek and Stiles freeze.

Well, Derek freezes.

Stiles' body still wobbles about a bit in his arms.

And then, while Stiles’ brain is still scrambling to pull itself together – pull _anything_ together – he feels Derek’s claws digging into his arm and leg.

“Oh fuck.”

Stiles has enough control over his body that he can turn his head to watch his father’s face as he takes in the change; the disbelief, the mounting terror. Then it’s swept away by something hard – his dad's toughest cop-face if, Stiles ever saw it – and he pulls his gun out of his holster.

"I need you to put Stiles down, son," his father says, voice all tense and battle-ready, barrel pointing to the ground.

Derek, the complete idiot, growls.

"Oh my god, _what_?!" Stiles exclaims, and he’s so filled with indignation that his arm gives a little twitch – a far cry from the slap to Derek's shoulder that he'd intended to deliver, but still more movement than he’s managed to produce since that asshole monster got him.

Derek only holds him tighter against his body.

Stiles’ dad lifts his gun higher, though he’s still mindful not to point it anywhere near Stiles’ body.

“ _Put. Him. Down.”_

“Dad, okay, I get that this doesn’t look great and all, but really, you need to-“

“Are you listening to me, Hale,” his dad says, completely ignoring Stiles, “I need you to put Stiles on the ground and back away.”

There’s a tension in his dad’s voice that’s setting Stiles’ teeth on edge and _fuck,_ god, he can feel Derek winding up like a fucking music box with a ballerina in it.

"Dude, un-wolf," Stiles hisses between his teeth, all the while trying to make reassuring faces at his father. It feels like one corner of his mouth still hasn’t quite gotten with the program yet, and he’s worried it all ends up a little lopsided. “Like, _now_!”

He receives a quiet growl in response. Then: “No.”

“What?!” Stiles demands. “Derek-…!”

"I _can't_!" Derek snaps.

“ _Hale!”_ Stiles’ dad barks because, shit, Derek had put some teeth in that snap, hadn’t he?

“Okay, dad, I’m gonna need you to-“

This time it’s Derek that cuts him off, with a growl so deep it seems it rumbles the earth. And, well, maybe it’s a little bit dad’s fault too, because Stiles spots him advancing with wary steps.

“ _Dad!”_ Stiles shouts, true alarm cutting through his voice. “Stay back, what the hell do you think you’re doing?!”

“We’ll get this sorted, won’t we?” his dad says, voice deathly even, and he seems to be addressing the two of them equally. “You’ll put Stiles on the ground and back away and then we’ll figure all of this out.”

His dad is steadily advancing, and Stiles can feel the tension mounting ever greater in every single fiber of Derek’s body.

“Dad, _please-!”_

Suddenly a lot of things happen in not a lot of time.

There’s a click, short and sharp enough that Stiles’ brain can only register it after it has happened, Derek snarls, the world spins, and he’s suddenly pressed up so tight against Derek’s body that he can barely breathe.

Dad has coked his gun.

“Okay, you need to back the _fuck_ off, Dad!” Stiles snaps loudly. “You’re scaring him!”

There’s a beat of silence.

It gives Stiles some time to reflect on that he has managed to drop two separate f-bombs on two of the most important men in his life: a ‘ _fuck’_ on his father, and a ‘ _feeling’_ on Derek. 

More silence.

Then – more clicks.

“Jesus _Christ,"_ Stiles hears his father mutter. “I’m scaring _him?”_

They go inside the house.

Dad holsters his gun, but Stiles notices that his hand never strays far from it.

Derek deposits Stiles' floppy body sitting onto the couch and takes a seat next to him, a hand on Stiles’ neck to keep him from tipping over. And, hey, Stiles has regained enough control at this point that he can keep his head upright, which is a definite advantage going into the harrowing conversation they’re about to have.

Stiles does the most talking, because whenever does he not?

It takes half an eternity and, shit, Stiles really should have prepared a PowerPoint or something, because he keeps losing track and having to double back and his dad asks all these questions and just-… ugh. _Ugh._

“So,” Stiles concludes, finally, and, hey, at least the horrifying amount of time he has spent having this conversation means that he’s recovered the ability to gesture weakly at Derek’s retracting claws (because _now_ he has all the control in the world, the _asshole)._ “Werewolves.”

His dad stares into empty space for several long moments.

Then he leans heavily back in his armchair, tipping his head back and staring at the ceiling.

The ticking from the clock in the kitchen is loud even to Stiles’ ears.

“Nope,” his dad says eventually, lifting his head. “Nope. No, I just- I can’t process this right now. Give me a week, maybe two. And I’m going to have all your friends over for questioning.”

“O-okay,” Stiles agrees haltingly, feeling simultaneously a great sense of trepidation and like he’s gotten off easy. “Are you going to ground me?”

“You’re eighteen,” his dad replies, still sounding very much out of it, staring blankly into the middle distance. “You’re an adult. I can’t ground you.”

Stiles hadn’t been aware that his dad had any such compunctions while he still lived at home, but he shan’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

“But, this…” Stiles’ dad continues, gesturing in a vague but all-encompassing way towards them. “How long has that been going on?”

Stiles feels Derek stiffen at his side, and he frowns.

“Uh, Dad, are you okay?” he asks. “We literally just went over that.”

Dad waves his concern away impatiently and his eyes finally focus properly on him. “No, not- not _werewolves._ I mean _this.”_

He gestures between Stiles and Derek again, looking at Stiles patiently.

Stiles looks back, and he suspects his face conveys enough confusion to be a retort, even though he doesn’t mean it that way.

Derek’s hand closes almost painfully over his forearm.

“You two,” his dad clarifies eventually. “How long have you been dating?”

Stiles feels like the whole world just stops.

Like, with one of those sound-effects when they switch to slow-motion in movies. _Whoooom._ Even the damn kitchen clock seems to shut up for far longer than the space between two seconds.

Then everything starts up again.

“Hahaha!” he says aloud, not quite managing to properly make it sound like a laugh, “Real funny, dad!”

His dad frowns.

“We’re not _dating_!” Stiles exclaims, and that came out weirdly insistent, didn’t it? It totally did and now it sounds like he’s lying even though he isn’t ( _oh, how he isn’t)_ , and how is all of this reading in Derek’s wolf-ears, anyway?

His eyes flick over him, but Derek looks like a statue and is keeping his eyes firmly forward.

He’s not _saying_ anything, though, which Stiles feels isn’t particularly helping their case. Stiles has got barely enough control of his torso to kind of shove his own arm into Derek’s side.

“We’re not dating,” Derek says, and his tone is _weird,_ like major _weird,_ and Stiles doesn’t know what it means, and he _definitely_ can’t guess whether it adds or detracts to their case in the eyes of his dad.

“Wow, nice, glad we got that cleared up!” Stiles says with false cheer.

He keeps flicking his eyes over to Derek, who’s very still and very silent.

His father’s face, though, is _fucking loud_ in communicating how _Very Dubious_ he’s finding literally everything about this situation.

Stiles forces a smile, and he doesn’t know if how difficult it is to do so is because of lingering paralytics in his blood steam or something else.

“Look, Dad,” he says, tries for the calm-and-reasonable instead of amused-and-dismissive. “I get what it looks like, Derek carrying me in here like some damsel in distress, but he’s just doing that ‘cause he’s a good alpha. I’m pack, so he needs to look after me, that’s all.”

His father turns suspicious eyes on Derek and Stiles feels _so_ bad, because Derek has literally just been trying to help and now he’s sucked into _this?_

And it’s just-… just fucking _embarrassing,_ is what it is.

“Dad, hey, look, I get what you might have picked up on, but it just isn’t like that, okay?” he tries, a bit firmer. “Would you drop it, please?”

Dad’s eyes turn back on him, which, hey, that was the goal, but it’s still not very pleasant.

“Derek’s just a friend,” he says firmly, meeting his father’s gaze nevertheless. “Nothing more, okay?”

His father sits back in his chair and his shoulders drop slightly.

“Okay,” he says, after another couple of moments. “I apologize for presuming. I just-… No more lies, okay, Stiles?”

Stiles nods earnestly, because that actually seems really nice.

“Yeah,” he promises. Then hesitates for a moment, feeling his face heat. “Is its-… er, I mean, could we have the whole not-quite-straight conversation sometime when there’s not an audience, though?”

He _feels_ the woosh of air as Derek’s head whips around and _shit._ Well, that answers the question of whether Derek knew or not.

Stiles barely manages to keep himself from flinching. And the paralytic probably does the heavy lifting on that one, to be honest.

His dad looks between Derek and him again. Then he sighs heavily.

“Sure, kid,” he says, then stands up. “I’m gonna go… do something that’s not in this room.”

Said and done, his father wanders off, muttering all the while.

Stiles waits, barely breathing, not really moving his eyes off the spot his father has vacated.

“Do the others know?” Derek asks finally.

Oh god, Stiles has never been this uncomfortable with anything _ever._

And he literally _just_ finished telling his father he’s been hanging with supernatural creatures of the night for the past couple of years.

“I mean, depends on what you mean, really,” he waffles. “I haven’t announced anything at all, so they’re basically free to draw whatever conclusions they want. And I mean, it’s not like I’ve been with _anyone_ yet, so it feels a little bit off to do a gender reveal beforehand, y’know? Like with babies. Except that’s exactly what you do with babies, I guess. Well, since there aren’t any clairvoyant ultrasounds for relationships, I figured I might as well wait and see what happened. And, I mean, who’s to say that I’m _ever_ going to see any action, so what does it matter what parts I like. And, I mean, who’d-”

“Which parts _do_ you like?” Derek interrupts, frowning hard.

“Yours,” Stiles immediately replies.

Fuck.

Fuck.

_Fuck._

Shit.

Fuck.

There’s a crash somewhere in the distance that Stiles thinks must have been his father dropping something, because his life didn’t suck enough already at this moment.

 _Oh fuck,_ Derek’s eyes are as red as Stiles’ face and right now he’s not sure which of the two are going to kill him first.

He’d say something in his defense, but he seems to have swallowed his tongue and all he manages is a hoarse sort of rasping choke.

“Generally or… specifically?” Derek asks and, yep, fuck, shit, he’s growling. Claws, there’s also claws, and Stiles is feeling very worried on behalf of the upholstery.

“Chill, okay, dude, I’m literally paralyzed right now, it’s not like I’m going to jump you!”

Derek bares his fangs in a snarl at that and his fists close even tighter on the fabric of the couch cushions.

“Answer. The. Question.” Derek bites out through clenched teeth.

And, yes, well, maybe that would have been higher up Stiles priority list if there wasn’t a whole lot of werewolf going on right at that moment. Canines and claws and eyes and- _Jesus,_ what the hell has gotten Derek like _this?_ Does he consider Stiles a _threat_ all of a sudden!? A- a _sexual_ threat!?

His confused stammering was evidently not enough for Derek, because suddenly Stiles found himself shoved back against the couch cushions with Derek standing over him, hands twisted into the fabric of his shirt.

“Aah!”

“ _Stiles!”_

“This is so intimidating, dude, what are you even doing?!”

“Answer the question!” Derek barks, shaking him by the grip on his shirt.

“What question?!”

“ _Generally_ _or_ _specifically_?!”

“I don’t even know what that’s supposed to _mean_!” Stiles protests, grabbing Derek’s arm.

Derek snarls loud and deep and get’s right up in his face.

“Do you like _dick_ ,” he growls, “or do you like _my_ dick?”

The gasp that escapes Stiles’ mouth is entirely involuntary.

The abrupt relocation of the blood is the fastest he’s ever experienced.

The only thing his brain produces is a cut-off and whimpering little _hngh._

And he manages to say literally nothing in reply.

Then his eyes slip down, entirely involuntarily.

And it’s _stupid. So_ fucking stupid, because the 100% most reasonable explanation is that Derek is _furious_ with him, but… that _growl._ It’s definitely supposed to be threatening, but Derek’s so _close_ and that’s made him lower his voice and-… Look, the absolute _least_ problematic part of Stiles’ patterns of attraction is any homosexual tendencies, and he’s long since faced this fact.

It’s unfortunate that Derek now seems to have to face it as well.

Finally, _far too late,_ he catches himself and returns his gaze to Derek’s eyes and Stiles’ face is _on fire._

“Yoursmostlysorry,” Stiles says, all in one breathless word, staring up into all that red.

Derek _attacks._

Stiles squeaks in fright, but the sound is muffled against Derek’s lips.

For another couple of heartbeats, Stiles’ still genuinely terrified because there’s _claws_ and _teeth_ and they’re descending on his body and-

_Tongue._

_Holy fuck_ , there’s tongue.

No venom in the world would likely be enough to stop him from throwing his arms around Derek and pull him down on top of him. Derek’s beard scrapes against his cheeks and lips, his lips are like fucking silk and _so_ warm and soft, and he tastes _just_ like he smells, and he _smells_ absolutely fucking beautifully and so much that it feels like it’s filling Stiles’ whole head up and spinning his whole world around.

A fang catches on Stiles’ lower lip and he moans helplessly.

Derek pulls away and Stiles feels like he’s stepping off a rollercoaster, wobbly and windswept. 

“… _what?”_ Stiles breathes.

“You’re _infuriating,”_ Derek informs him, leaning their foreheads together.

Stiles processes this for a moment.

“… and sexy?” he tries.

Derek pulls back to glare at him but doesn’t protest, which Stiles takes as agreement.

Suddenly his father’s voice calls from somewhere further in the house: “So are you dating _now?”_

And HOLY FUCK, way to be unchill! Literally _one kiss_ and his father is already-

“Yes,” Derek reply is loud and clear and unwavering. 

Stiles smiles so wide it hurts.

“Great,” his dad calls, somewhat long-suffering, but still sounding like he means it. “Congratulations. Please do consider my blood pressure before engaging in any activities in public areas of the house.”

Derek’s ears turn red, but his lips quirk upwards. Stiles presses his lips to his smile because that’s something he can do now.


End file.
